Category: Celebrations of Life

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March 21, 2021 – Rev. Marti Keller

“Finishing the Fight and Equality’s Call”

As we near the end of Women’s History Month, the titles and themes of two newish children’s books on brave and revolutionary women provides inspiration and fodder for a look at the status of gender justice in a non-binary world.

Rev. Marti Keller comes into 2021 with a lengthy involvement in issues impacting the human rights of women identified persons, including being the director of community and government relations for Planned Parenthood in Northern California and 20 years of leadership with the Unitarian Universalist Women’s Federation. She was given their ministry to Women Award in 2020 in recognition of “her commitment to anti-racism and intersectionality in the approach to women’s issues.” Her roles included heading the Margaret Fuller Awards Panel, presidency of the Board, co-facilitator of the New Prophetic Sisterhood of UU religious professionals, creator of the UUWF sermon award, and affiliated minister.

Rev. Keller’s presentation may be viewed at: https://www.facebook.com/FirstExistentialist/videos/931565920992683

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March 14, 2021 – Paula Larke

“Beware the Belittled: A new world view on the old ‘Hell hath no fury’ line”

Paula Larke is a storyteller, motivational speaker, spoken word/vocal innovator, bassist and percussionist. She has used her music, passion, and humor nationally, for over 38 years, to unite, chide, inspire, and restore faith in the human potential for harmony. Her primary work is in community – schools, churches, state fairs, businessmen’s luncheons, workplace employee training – every kind of community gathering allowing her access. Most recently, Paula has been a teaching artist in Eastern Kentucky and Clarkston, GA, adapting her delivery for Appalachian and international refugee audiences. “It has been an enriching experience, seeing through eyes so different from my own” she affirms.

Paula’s CD, “UNITY IN THE COMMUNITY,” produced with activist/percussionist Kim Nimoy, is a performance libretto, designed for use in schools and colleges.

You can view Paula’s presentation here: https://www.facebook.com/FirstExistentialist/videos/1057859461370558

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March 7, 2021 – Lisa Cottrell

“Liberation, personal and political”

Lisa Cottrell

Lisa is a psychotherapist in private practice, a poet, writer, and activist. She is a long time member of the First Existentialist Congregation. She has been a student of Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh since 1999 and has studied with many other Buddhist teachers. Lisa incorporates feminism, existentialism, mindfulness and compassion in her therapy practice. She also trains therapists how to use mindfulness in their lives and professional practices. She offers her CD, Mindful Meditations for Well Being, as a free download from: www.wellbeingpsychotherapy.net.

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February 28, 2021 – Loretta Ross

“Calling In Democracy”

Loretta Ross is a Visiting Associate Professor at Smith College teaching “White Supremacy in the Age of Trump.” She started her career in the women’s movement in the 1970s, working at the D.C. Rape Crisis Center, the National Organization for Women, the National Black Women’s Health Project, the Center for Democratic Renewal (National Anti-Klan Network), the National Center for Human Rights Education, and SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective. Her forthcoming book is Calling In the Calling Out Culture.  Her most recent publications are Reproductive Justice: An Introduction and Radical Reproductive Justice.

Ms. Ross’s presentation may be viewed at: https://www.facebook.com/FirstExistentialist/videos/171350467934921

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February 21, 2021 – Dominic Thomas

“What’s really stopping mental health justice progress? A story from the trenches”

Dominic Thomas is a father of three, husband and believer in progress who once served at First E and is also a

professor and consultant. He regularly volunteers in a variety of causes and groups, particularly as a Scout leader. Some of his current work focuses on digitizing the global maritime industry as well as enabling crisis response improvements in mental health scenarios.

Dominic’s presentation may be viewed at: https://www.facebook.com/FirstExistentialist/videos/1926571450814452

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February 14, 2021 – Rev. Marsha Mitchiner

“Still Loving in the Midst of Chaos”

Rev. Marsha Mitchiner

Our Fellowship Minister, Rev. Marsha Mitchiner, has served the Congregation for over two decades, since ordination by us, following her study with Lanier Clance. She counsels, connects, and contacts members and friends, and for those who need it, performs the laying-on of hands in her role as a massage therapist. Many of us can vouch for the quality of her work, and appreciate the wisdom, restraint, and compassion she brings to the job of caring for our Congregation.

Marsha speaks once each quarter, and helps smooth the functioning of the Congregation innumerable times in between.

Marsha’s presentation may be viewed at: https://www.facebook.com/FirstExistentialist/videos/432123741232472

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February 7, 2021 – Anthony Knight

“The Threat of Blackness: Black History Month and the Promise of Self”

Anthony Knight is the President & CEO of The Baton Foundation, a Georgia nonprofit organization that serves the emotional, intellectual and cultural needs of Black boys in grades five through nine. Before founding the Foundation, Mr. Knight worked for twenty-two years as a museum educator and consultant.

Mr. Knight has extensive experience with and interest in African-American history and culture, public and living history, informal education and Black youth. Mr. Knight’s work with The Baton Foundation reflects his ongoing interest in the issues and practices related to the collecting, preservation and interpretation of information about and material culture from the African Diaspora.

Mr. Knight’s undergraduate work was in Spanish and English (Ohio Wesleyan University), and his graduate work was in museum education (The George Washington University). Mr. Knight also holds a degree in Spanish-to-English translation from the Núcleo de Estudios Lingüísticos y Sociales, Caracas, Venezuela. Mr. Knight is a New York City native.

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January 31, 2021 – Ellen Griffith Spear

“A Just and Reparative Environmental Policy”

Ellen Griffith Spears
Ellen Griffith Spear

The assault on environmental protection, public health, and human dignity of the past four years – in defiance of Congressional authority and public will – has undermined not only the most basic protections of clean air and clean water but also the rule of law. The new administration offers the possibility of reversing a decades-long slide in environmental regulation, enacting meaningful steps to mitigate climate change, and moving quickly to protect public health. How can we collectively confront the multiple challenges to enacting just and reparative environmental and public health policies?

Ellen Griffith Spears teaches environmental history and policy in the interdisciplinary New College and the Department of American Studies at the University of Alabama. Her most recent book, Rethinking the America Environmental Movement post-1945 (Routledge Press, 2019), reconsiders U.S. environmentalism in the context of broader social justice movements. Spears’ 2014 book, Baptized in PCBs: Race, Pollution, and Justice in an All-American Town (University of North Carolina Press), on environmental justice activism in Anniston, Alabama, was recognized by the Southern Historical Association, the Southern Environmental Law Center, and the Medical Care Section of the American Public Health Association. Prior to joining the faculty at Alabama, Spears worked for Atlanta-based social justice organizations and taught courses at Emory and at Agnes Scott College.

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January 24, 2021 – Rev. Janna Nelson

“Long as You’re Living: A Sermon in Three Songs and Some Words”

Reverend Janna Nelson was ordained by the First Existentialist Congregation of Atlanta in 1999, where she was an active member for decades before moving to Albuquerque, New Mexico, to be closer to her large family. She is a retired elementary school teacher and preschool director who enjoys children and who learns as much from them as they do from her. She misses the daily opportunities to address various biases and provide more accurate historical perspectives for children, to build empathy and critical thinking as they try to understand their place in this complex world. She was singing with a sister in classrooms in a local school until the pandemic closed schools down in March.

Since moving to Albuquerque, she has finally had the time and opportunity to explore her voice more fully as a teacher, as well as mess around on the piano more. This time and work have given her the confidence to start teaching a little piano and voice, meeting people where they are.

She is honored to be speaking to the congregation and is grateful to be invited to share reflections through an existential/feminist perspective, going back to source material. She had personal experiences as a young person that stirred ideas about life that she later found expressed by these writers and thinkers. These ideas and concepts continue to be a touchstone for a way to live life more fully, with all its complexity and grief and uncertainty, to participate in freedom from oppression and alienation of all kinds, a way to keep moving forward, to help build something good, to participate in healing. A way to still live in the moment, to find lightness, to cultivate curiosity, to let in beauty, to grow and expand, to connect with others, even while living in these times.

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January 17, 2021 – Rev. Duncan Teague

“Our Right to Dreams of Justice”

Rev. Duncan Teague (former longtime member of the First E Cong) dreamed and planted the Abundant Love Unitarian Universalist (UU) Congregation in the West End community of SW Atlanta. Abundant LUUv, soon 3 years old, February 2021, is committed to the work of healing communities. The congregation is working, for example, with Emory’s Rollins School of Public Health and the School of Nursing to assist with research to inform faith-based HIV/AIDS prevention programs from the perspective of Black gay and bi-sexual men. Rev. Teague has served a term on the UU Ministers’ Association’s Committee on Anti-Racism, Anti-Oppression, and Multiculturalism (CARAOM) and the Appointments Committee of the UUA Board of Trustees. Rev. Teague resides in Decatur, GA with his husband, David Thurman, a retired researcher, celebrating 27 years together.